


24 Hours (‘Til the End of the World)

by lovecatcadillac



Category: Bomb Girls
Genre: F/F, Familial Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-02
Updated: 2012-06-07
Packaged: 2017-11-06 14:31:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/419966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovecatcadillac/pseuds/lovecatcadillac
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Missing moments from Elements of Surprise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Trigger warning for abuse, especially in the first chapter.
> 
> Disclaimer: All characters and environments belong to Michael Maclennan and Adrienne Mitchell/Shaw Media.

Kate’s father doesn’t look the way Betty imagined. He is tall and stern and imposing, but not brutish-looking. He looks like a neatly dressed, grey-haired man in his fifties, the same as anybody else’s father. There’s even a family resemblance between him and Kate; their eyes are almost exactly the same shade of blue. Betty wasn’t expecting that. She’s never asked Kate what her birth name is, so his addressing her as Marion makes the experience even more unsettling.

Something about the click of the door as Kate shuts them into her bedroom makes Betty lurch to life. “He didn’t hit you, did he?” Betty takes both of Kate’s hands, the better to peer at her arms, looking for bruises.

“I’m fine, I promise.” Kate pulls away. When Betty walked in, she was cowering in a corner, her face screwed up as though anticipating a blow. Now, mere moments later, Kate is pale and subdued, but otherwise almost eerily calm and collected. Her composure wrong-foots Betty. She always thought that if Kate ever saw her father again, she’d be inconsolable. Looking at her now, Betty would never guess that Kate just came face to face with the man who left those scars all over her back.

Betty has never been more thankful that she is the way she is. If she liked men, she would be at the movies with Susan, Dolores and Phyllis, swooning over Johnny Weissmuller. She would have returned to find Kate gone, dragged off by that sick bastard who calls himself her father. As it happens, she likes women, so the only excursion she’s taken tonight was a quick jaunt to buy cigarettes.

God, if she had returned just a few minutes later…

“I’m sorry,” she says. Those aren’t words Betty says very often, even to Kate (her apology after their first real argument consisted entirely of the words, “I’m a clod.”), but right now, she feels them right down to her bones. “Are you sure you’re not hurt?”

Kate shakes her head. “Nothing happened. Would you sit with me for a little while?”

It is such an abrupt segue into such a bizarrely simple request that Betty isn’t sure she heard correctly. At Kate’s questioning look, she answers, “‘Course. Anything you want.”

Kate sits down on the bed. Betty has no idea what to do or say. She wants to take Kate in her arms and hold her, wants to rage at Kate’s father for doing this to her, for walking back into their lives when they’ve been so happy. The most harmless of the many thoughts chasing each other through her head is that Kate really ought to towel her hair off properly if she doesn’t want to catch a chill. But perhaps it would be insensitive to point that out.

“It’s dark out,” says Kate vaguely.

Betty stares at her. It’s getting on for ten at night, and it’s December. Even in the city, it doesn’t get much darker than this.

“I was never really frightened of the dark, growing up. Isn’t that funny? Most children are,” says Kate conversationally. “When I was about six, we had a wicker basket where we kept clean towels and sheets. I used to crawl inside it and close the lid on top of me. I liked it in there. I liked the way it smelled.” Kate pauses. “Do you mind if we turn the light off now? Not to go to sleep. Just to sit, for a little bit.”

“In the dark?”

“Yeah.”

“Kate, are you _sure_ -”

“Yes. Just sit with me, would you, please?”

Betty clambers onto the bed beside Kate. For once, Kate doesn’t have to ask her to remove her shoes. “Kate, how did he find you?” Betty asks.

“Father saw the photos Chet took. He tracked him down and paid him for my address,” says Kate, without emotion.

“Was he angry?” Betty wants to smack herself in the forehead as soon as the words leave her mouth. Why is she so spectacularly bad at this?

“He wasn’t all that surprised.” Kate casts her gaze toward the closed bedroom door. “Could you turn out the overhead light, please?”

Wordlessly, Betty crosses the room and switches out the light, plunging them into darkness. She sits down next to Kate. Their shoulders touch lightly for a moment, before Kate leans back against the headboard, breaking that tiny contact.

Kate begins to speak. “My father’s always said he could see something _wrong_ inside me. Even if I hadn’t done anything yet, he could see that I wanted to. He said I had to keep praying for guidance until I stopped wanting it. Women aren’t supposed to, after all.”

“S’posed to what?”

“To … do things. With men.” Kate swallows. “He said he could see I wanted to – to give myself to every man I saw. He could tell it from the way I stood, the way I looked at people, even the way I sang. That’s why I wasn’t allowed to go to pictures or dances. Even if I didn’t find someone, it would just give me ideas.”

Betty wants to cry out in revulsion, in anger, at the very idea of someone saying these things to Kate. She remains quiet. She knows from experience that there are some confessions where you don’t want someone chiming in with an opinion.

“Last winter, we took rooms in a boarding house in Spruce Grove, when the weather got too cold to stay in our trailer. I’ve always liked settling down for the winter. We couldn’t ever afford to stay anywhere really nice, but it didn’t matter. For the coldest weeks of the year, we’d have hot baths, and quiet evenings reading the gospels while it snowed outside, and Christmas as a family. Father would room with the boys, to supervise them, and I’d share with my mother. She and I would sit up together knitting and talking, and she’d tell me stories about when she was a girl. By last winter, I’d heard most of the stories, but I liked hearing them anyway. They made me feel like I was little again, back before so many things went wrong.”

They sit in silence for a few minutes. Kate’s breathing slows, and Betty wonders whether she’s fallen asleep. “Kate?” she whispers.

Kate begins speaking again, as if the pause hadn’t happened. “A few weeks before we took lodgings, Father found me doing something I shouldn’t. I don’t want to tell you what it was, so don’t ask. I’ve put it behind me.

“He was so angry, but it was different to before. Usually, he’d get angry, but he’d be all right again the next day. This time, he didn’t speak to me for days. Even when he started talking to me again, it was as if he’d given up on me, like he couldn’t be bothered with me any more. I tried to be as good as I’ve ever been in my life, but he wouldn’t forget. Nothing I could do could make him forget.

“I just wanted him to love me again. He used to read to me when I was little. I had a book, _Bible Stories for Girls._ It was a Sunday school prize. It had such lovely pictures. I used to sit and talk to the pictures for hours, tell them all my secrets. First time I ever saw Gladys, I thought she looked like the picture of Esther, out of that book. Tall and beautiful, with all that dark hair. Just like Esther.” She lets out a ragged breath. “Father was so proud of me for winning that prize. He didn’t like to say so, he didn’t want to give me a swelled head, but he’d never say no, not once, when I asked for a story out of _Bible Stories for Girls._ He didn’t used to hurt me, not back then.

“At the boarding house, I plucked up my courage, and I took him aside and said, ‘Father, I know I did wrong. Please tell me how I can make it right again.’ He looked at me for a long time, and he said he believed me. He said that he would come get me that night, and we’d pray together for me to be forgiven.

“Mother was asleep when he finally showed. He stood in the doorway and said, ‘Come along, Marion. It’s time to wash away your sins.’ I went with him. I trusted him, of course. He’s my father. He led me down the hallway, to one of the bathrooms, where he’d filled a bath for me. I thought maybe he was going to baptise me. He baptised all of us, Richie and Walt and I, when we were babies, so why shouldn’t he do it again? I trusted him,” she repeats, before falling silent.

Betty is filled with dread. Much as she wants it to come as a complete shock, she can see where this story is going. She hopes to God that she’s wrong. She doesn’t want anything as awful as what she’s imagining to happen to Kate, not in the past, the present or the future.

“I got into the bath and he -” Kate gives a little gasp and has to steady herself. “He pushed me down under the water. I didn’t have time to take a breath before he did it. He held me down, around my neck. I blacked out.”

“Kate…” Horror-struck, as if this scene is happening before her eyes and not a year in the past, Betty gropes for Kate’s hand, holding it in both of hers. Kate doesn’t respond.

Dispassionately, she continues her story. “When he let me out, I started shrieking and yelling at him. I cursed him, said the most awful words. I didn’t even know I knew words like that. They were so much worse than anything you’ve ever said,” says Kate, acknowledging Betty for the first time in minutes. “He never hit me in the face before that, but he h-hit me, and … I wouldn’t be quiet. I could hear myself, but I couldn’t make myself stop. My mother and brothers woke up, and the hall porter came running. Father said I’d slipped and hit my head getting ready to take a bath, but Walt was the only one who seemed to believe him.

“We had to leave that boarding house at first light, and move back into the trailer. We couldn’t get rooms anywhere else. That was such a cold, cold winter. My mother fell ill. It wasn’t the worst she’d ever been, but it was my fault that she was sick. If I hadn’t done that terrible thing – I wish I could take it back.”

Betty hears the faint metallic sound of Kate pulling her mother’s locket out from the neckline of her nightgown, winding the chain through her fingers.

“When Father started beating me again … it was awful, but in a way, it was almost a relief. At least it showed he hadn’t given up on me,” says Kate. “Afterwards, every time, he would apologise for getting so carried away. He’d say, ‘God’s will, not my own.’ What was worse was that every time Mother and I were alone together, she’d start talking about how I had to leave. ‘Marion, you have to run away, change your name, try and get a different life for yourself before it’s too late.’ I thought she didn’t love me any more. I wanted to die.”

Kate is crying a little. They both are. It is easier, in the dark.

And then Kate says the most wonderful thing. “It was wrong. I know that now. I always thought it was because I was bad, but that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter how bad I was. It’s not for us to judge other people. We’re not supposed to punish them. If you or my mother or my brothers did the worst, most unspeakable things, if you killed someone, if you killed a hundred people, I wouldn’t take it upon myself to punish you. I would try to understand. I’d feel sorry for the people you hurt. I’d pray for you, try to help you, but I wouldn’t punish you. That’s right, isn’t it?”

Betty must speak. Betty cannot speak. If she speaks, she’ll start sobbing, and then Kate will feel she has to comfort her.

“Isn’t it?” Kate presses, sounding desperate.

Betty turns to her. “Kate, you’re not bad. You’re _not._ You know that, don’t you?”

“I don’t feel bad when I’m with you. That’s why I love … being with you so much.”

“Well, good. You should feel like you’re good all the time, not just when you’re with me.” God, all her words sound so paltry. So feeble.

“I’m trying my best.” Kate’s voice is so faint, like she’s slipping away. “But when I saw him-”

“Never mind what he thinks! Nobody could ask for a better daughter than you. He’s crazy if he thinks there’s anything wrong with you. Forget him, Kate. Forget all about him.”

“He didn’t always beat me. Not like this, not so it left scars. How’d it all go so wrong?”

“ _He’s_ wrong. And you’re good, and I-” She steels herself. “I care about you.”

The silence that follows is different to the ones that came before. There’s no possibility that Kate has drifted off; Betty can almost hear Kate’s brain whirring at high speed. She’s afraid she’s said too much.

Suddenly, Kate is hugging Betty harder than anyone’s ever hugged her in her life. “Stay here with me,” says Kate in a rush. “I need you.”

It’s depraved and wrong, but something about the phrase, about Kate’s tone when she says it, about being hugged so tightly on Kate’s bed in the dark, makes Betty think of things she shouldn’t. She feels so dishonest, like she’s conning Kate into something despicable. If Kate knew what she was, there’s no way she’d want them to sleep in the same bed.

Kate seems to take Betty’s lack of a response as reluctance. “Don’t leave, please.” Kate leans over and switches on her bedside lamp. Betty blinks at the sudden light, but Kate doesn’t seem to notice. She jumps lightly to her feet and goes to the wardrobe in the corner. “You can wear my other nightgown.” She takes out the nightgown and offers it to Betty, her outstretched arm trembling visibly. “I can’t be alone. I need you.”

_ McRae, you selfish cow, _ thinks Betty.  _ This isn’t about you or the way you feel about her. She’s scared, and she’s wondering why in God’s name you’re not doing the decent thing and saying you’ll stay. _

“Of course I’ll stay,” Betty says. “I’ll stay. It’s not even a question.”

Betty changes quickly into the nightgown. Usually, when they change clothes in front of each other, Kate will stare out the window, or over Betty’s shoulder, or at her own feet. Now, Kate sits on the bed, hugging her knees, not taking her eyes off Betty. There’s nothing lustful in her gaze – she looks lost, more than anything else – but Betty still feels distinctly weird, being visually devoured like this. She’s not used to being on the receiving end of a look.

Kate beckons her into the bed, pulling the blanket over the two of them, and turns out the lamp. They lie uneasily side by side, covered by darkness again. After a minute or two, Kate remarks, “Your feet are cold.”

“Sorry,” grunts Betty, moving them away.

There is a pause. Kate turns over, wraps her arm around Betty’s waist, and pulls her close. Betty is so shocked that she forgets to breathe. Whenever they’ve shared a bed, they’ve always slept back to back, the way Betty used to with her girl cousins long ago. She used to hate sleepovers with her cousins, Lillie and Mavis and Nora. Whichever cousin Betty was sharing with, they would always sleep as far from her as they possibly could, as if being an oddball and a tomboy were somehow catching.

She’s often wondered how on earth she can fancy other women, considering she’s never really gotten on with them. It’s only in the past year that she’s made platonic female friends for the first time. Outside of Toronto and Vic Mu, most women seem to sense there’s something funny about Betty. They tend to keep their distance from her. She’s always supposed it was just a case of wanting what she couldn’t have.

Betty has always felt like a vampire who could only come out after dark. The idea of drifting off to sleep curled around a woman was laughable, even more ridiculous than publicly holding hands or dancing together – both of which, she realises now, she’s done with Kate. Both of which, Kate initiated.

Honestly, she can’t even feel dirty about enjoying this. Part of her wants to cry at this, at all of it; about how good it feels, how long she’s waited without even realising she was waiting. The rest just wants to melt like a snowflake on a warm window pane. _If this were my last moment, I could die happy,_ she thinks.

“This is nice,” murmurs Kate, almost to herself. Her voice is a little stronger when she says, “It’s all right, I’m here. Go to sleep.”

It should feel odd, being soothed to sleep, being assured that she’s safe, when Kate is the one who’s received such a terrible shock tonight. Yet there is something comforting about being reassured that Kate is not going anywhere. The thing they’ve both been dreading happened, and they survived it. Kate stood strong. She stood strong…


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: All characters and environments belong to Michael Maclennan and Adrienne Mitchell/Shaw Media
> 
> Notes: Features a reference to a line in Chapter 5 of my other fic, _The Feeling, Itself._

When Betty wakes, Kate’s arm is still draped loosely over her. She thinks for a second that she must be dreaming. Kate’s been occupying a starring role in Betty’s dreams for months now. Back when they were just getting to know each other, Betty used to have terrible, stupid dreams about Kate walking around arm in arm with Gladys, and both of them laughing at her. She would wake from those dreams with a splitting headache from clenching her jaw in her sleep, exasperated with herself for having dreams better suited to a dopey teenager than a grown woman.

As Betty and Kate grew closer, those dreams were replaced by ones which were a lot more pleasant to have, but harder to wake up from. Most mornings, Betty wakes feeling some combination of bittersweet and lonely, horribly embarrassed, or hot and dissolving all over, depending on how Kate has been in her dreams that night.

For so long now, the best feeling Betty has been able to hope for was _good but guilty,_ and that counts double around Kate. When Kate sings, when she laughs, when she shows these signs of coming out of her shell and revelling in all the joy life can offer her, Betty always feels her heart swell, and then immediately has to feel bad about it. She doesn’t feel bad now. Betty just feels purely good, lying here with Kate curled around her.

It’s when the mere concept of feeling bad occurs to Betty that the memories of last night roll in like summer thunderheads over the prairie. Betty turns cold inside just thinking about Kate’s father, his grim smile when he told Betty it was a pleasure to meet her when she’d overheard him screaming at his daughter mere seconds before. As if he thought it was of no consequence, like Kate wasn’t even a person.

 _He oughta be in prison,_ she thinks. _Or an asylum. How in the hell could you look at someone like Kate and think she deserves to be hurt?_ She has never felt less sick than she does right now. People might say it’s wrong, but if it’s between being in love with Kate and wanting to hurt her, she would pick the former, every time, forever.

“Is it time to wake up yet?” Kate asks. Her voice sounds relaxed, but not remotely sleep-addled. Betty’s heart leaps at the idea, the wonderful impossible notion, that Kate might have been lying there awake, enjoying their closeness the way Betty is.

“Few more minutes,” says Betty, trying to sound absolutely normal, as though waking up in someone else’s embrace is something that happens to her all the time, as though she isn’t seriously considering just not turning up to work today. _Hang the consequences,_ she thinks, exhilarated. _They can fire me. I wouldn’t get out of bed and go to work if all the floor boys had organised to dress in drag and perform the Ziegfeld Follies, today and today only. I’d rather stay here, all day. With Kate._

Utterly unaware of Betty’s train of thought, Kate actually snuggles closer. “You’re warm,” she murmurs.

Betty takes a huge chance. “So’re you,” she replies, and feels it all the way through her when Kate laughs into her shoulder.

They lie in silence, listening to the wind outside, the faint patter of rain on the roof, the sounds of the other rooming house women rising, washing, dressing, calling to each other.

“… all right, we really do have to get up now,” Betty says, a little awkwardly. She successfully extricates herself from underneath Kate’s arm, slides out from under the blankets – and then turns around to look down at Kate.

Kate beams up at her. “Hi.”

“Hey,” Betty replies.

“How’d you sleep?”

“Good.” Betty rubs the back of her neck. “You?”

“Better than I expected. Thanks for staying with me. I’d never have been able to get to sleep without you.”

“Pleasure.” Betty feels infinitely grateful that the conversation thus far has only required one-word answers, because waking up in Kate’s bed with Kate gazing at her like she’s a miracle, a godsend, a knight in shining armour is not doing much for Betty’s conversational abilities.

Kate sits up. She winces as her bare feet hit the floor. “Don’t you wish we could have a nice long lie-in?”

“The thought had crossed my mind.”

“Want some breakfast? It’s so cold, I thought I’d make oatmeal. There’ll be plenty for you, if you’re interested.” Kate sounds so practical. It’s hard to imagine her the way she was last night, weeping in the dark about being bad.

No sooner has Betty replied, “Sure, I’d like that,” than Kate has gone, promising to bring breakfast up for them. Being left alone so abruptly brings up weird feelings inside Betty, memories of being hustled down back steps or shoved into a bathroom what seemed like seconds after she had been in a clinch with someone.

“Don’t be stupid,” she says aloud. If Kate can be practical after the night they had, so can Betty. She uses the fifteen minutes Kate takes to fetch breakfast to nip over to her bedroom, to get washed and dressed and have a cigarette.

She hears Kate call for her in the hallway before she peers into Betty’s room. “There you are! Sorry that took so long. There was a bit of a line for the stove,” says Kate. “Lots of cooked breakfasts this morning.”

“Hey, it’s nice having someone else make it for me. I’m not a half-bad cook, but oatmeal’s the one thing I’ve never been able to crack. Mine always turns out like cement.”

Kate goes to stand by the window, blowing on her bowl to cool it. The weak winter sunshine turns dazzling as soon as it hits Kate’s hair, and Betty can’t help but laugh, at the very idea that she’s babbling to someone so beautiful about _oatmeal,_ of all things.

A minute or two passes. Kate has stopped trying to cool her oatmeal, but she still hasn’t eaten any. Kate asks tentatively, “Betty?”

“Yeah?”

“What if Gladys isn’t there today? Her father was so furious when he found her working the line yesterday.”

“You really think Gladys is gonna let anyone tell her what she can and can’t do? Least of all her parents?” It is the thing Betty finds most annoying about Gladys, but also the thing that makes Betty feel a grudging respect for her.

Kate smiles a little. “You’re right.” She eats about half of her oatmeal before setting the bowl down on the bureau.

“You’re not slimming, are you?” Betty’s own bowl is scraped clean.

“My stomach’s a bit jumpy,” Kate replies.

“I’ll wash these, you’ve gotta get dressed.” Betty heads downstairs, streams into the kitchen, dumps the bowls into the sink and begins rolling up her sleeves. She actually starts whistling an off-key approximation of _Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy._

“Goddamned morning people,” groans Moira, who is sitting at the table and clutching a cup of coffee. “Knock it off, Betty. I’ve got a brass band in my skull right now, I don’t need you too.”

“And a good morning to you, too, Moira dear,” Betty teases her, setting to work on the bowls. “Enjoy yourself last night?”

Moira looks her up and down. “Evidently not as much as you did. You have a hot date or something?”

“Nope, I’m just full of the joys of spring. Or December, if you wanna get technical about it.”

She ought to be more concerned about the insinuation there – what if someone who saw her walk out of Kate’s room this morning hears the phrase “hot date” and puts two and two together? – but she really is terribly happy right now. There is something indefinably lovely about Kate making breakfast and Betty doing the dishes.

It shouldn’t feel as nice as it does. Betty’s good at housework, but she hates it. She spent her childhood and adolescent years picking up after her brothers, doing the dishes and the mending because it was beneath them, as men, to scrub a saucepan or sew a button themselves. Betty remembers being eight, twelve, seventeen, twenty-two, standing at the sink for what felt like hours, cursing under her breath at the sound of her brothers playing cards in the next room. She’s never been able to work out why everyone was so astonished that she was short with people. _Anybody_ would be in a permanently filthy mood if that was how they spent their evenings.

Once she’s stacked the bowls in the cupboard and heaved the saucepan back onto its shelf, Betty just about flies upstairs, to fetch Kate so they can leave for work. There is a sense of urgency to it entirely separate from the way she feels about Kate. It’s ten to eight, and their street car leaves at eight sharp.

When Betty pokes her head around Kate’s door, Kate is brushing her hair out, humming idly to herself. Betty never thought she’d see the day when she’d be remotely interested in watching someone do their hair, but she finds herself just staring, for a moment.

Kate agreed to be her housemate someday. This could happen every morning, only without rooming house women racketing down the hallway or hogging the stovetop. The evenings wouldn’t be so different either; eating dinner together, listening to the radio, playing cards and laughing about everything and nothing. The only thing that would be different would be what would happen once they went into their bedroom…

Betty wonders what it would be like, to make love to Kate with lights on and doors open, without having to worry about being overheard, the way she’s never been able to with anyone before. A rather vivid mental image blooms in Betty’s mind, of the way Kate might look at the moment of climax.

Her face grows hot and she has to turn away, to try and squash the thought, but it’s too late, it exists now. It ought to feel like the most depraved idea anyone has ever entertained, the very thought of someone sweet, sincere, godly and pure like Kate Andrews kissing and touching another woman. Betty’s had thoughts like that before, and they made her feel like the pervert everyone would think she was if she were more obvious about being queer.

But it doesn’t feel quite as awful as it used to, in light of everything that’s happened. Kate wearing the hairpin Betty got her like a lucky charm, Kate calling her a hero, Kate pointing right at her and singing _I wished on the moon for you_ with every syllable heavy with feeling, with meaning. Is it so unlikely that Kate might feel the same? If Kate did those things with a man, all the rooming house girls would be joshing her about her sweetheart and asking when the wedding was.

Four out of Betty’s six brothers are married with kids. She likes some of her nieces and nephews better than others, but on the whole, she’s not remotely torn up about the prospect of never being someone’s mother. Betty’s not much for children. She always thought she wasn’t much for marriage either. Until Kate.

Some of the couples Betty runs into at Tangiers are as married as you can get without actually being legally wed. They wear rings on their little fingers, so everyone knows they’re together for life. She and Kate could do that someday.

… For God’s sakes, they’ve never even kissed, and she’s imagining wedded bliss? What is the matter with her? She’s known what she is all her life, but she’s never been this gone on anyone, not ever. It’s not safe. She can’t be sure that Kate feels the same.

 _Stop treating it like it’s safe, when it’s not,_ Betty reprimands herself. _Stop staring at her. Nobody wants someone like you staring at them._ Of course, the second Betty tells herself not to look at Kate any more, she looks, to see whether Kate is aware that she’s looking.

From what Betty can see, Kate is fully made up and ready to go, yet she isn’t moving away from the mirror. She stares into the glass with a tense, troubled expression on her face.

“Kate?” calls Betty. “Somethin’ wrong?”

Kate gives a start. “Oh! Betty, you made me jump.”

“I’ve been standing here for a minute now,” says Betty. She realises how that sounds and wants to kick herself. “You ready to go?” Betty asks, more gruffly than is strictly necessary.

“Just about.” Kate knots her scarf, smooths imaginary wrinkles out of her winter coat, then gestures to her mouth. “Too much?” she asks. Kate loves wearing lipstick – Betty gets the feeling it’s something she’s wanted to do for years – but she took Lorna’s comment about wearing enough of it to paint a battleship to heart.

Betty shakes her head. “Nah, looks good. C’mon, we’d better hightail it.”

In the front hallway, Kate stops to peek in the mail box labelled _K. Andrews._ “Nothing,” she says, sounding disappointed. “I thought maybe he might…”

“You expecting a letter from one of your boys?” Kate writes to two young soldiers once a week. Even Betty isn’t paranoid enough to regard them as real contenders for Kate’s affections, considering they’re both about nineteen, and Kate has always been very clear about having a very specific type in mind for marriage. All of a sudden, Betty is reminded of her and Kate, coming home from work a few weeks ago, and Kate saying – actually saying – _“I always thought I’d marry someone a little older than me. How old are you, again?”_

“Brian still writes me. He’s a real peach. Trevor seems to have cooled off. I guess there are prettier girls in France.”

“Unlikely,” Betty says, emboldened by her memory, before adding, “It’s his loss.”

Kate smiles. “You’re sweet.” She glances at the hall clock. “And golly, are we ever late! Come on!”

They have to run for their street car, but make it just in time. As Betty collapses into an aisle seat, she exclaims, “Safe!” She’s laughing. She can’t remember ever being able to laugh this freely, before Kate. It’s funny how being in love can make vaguely annoying things like running for the street car seem hilarious.

From across the centre aisle, two seats down, the closest vacant seat, Kate tosses her hair back over her shoulder. “I’m getting better at running in heels, are you proud?”

“Definitely. You’ll be outstripping Jesse Owens, before long.”

“I think Carol Demers is the one to beat, actually,” says Kate, with a smirk.

“Oh, lord.” Betty widens her eyes, bounces twice in her seat and squeaks, “Scram! Vamoose!” They dissolve into laughter. It’s extremely undignified, grown women having a giggling fit on the street car, but Betty doesn’t mind being undignified if it’s with Kate.

The street car trundles toward Vic Mu, filled with chattering women on their way to work. People jump on and off. As soon as the seat beside Betty is vacated, Kate slides into it, as though she had been waiting. She says, all straight out, “I’ve got a singing lesson with Leon, at Tangiers this afternoon. If you came along, we could have a drink afterwards.”

“You and me and Leon?” asks Betty carefully.

Kate blinks as though that hadn’t occurred to her. “Well, I could ask him, but I’m pretty sure he’s got places to be. Someone to get home to.” At Betty’s expression, Kate laughs. “Oh, didn’t you know he’s married?”

Betty watches the colour rise in Kate’s cheeks. “I did not know that.” Betty grins. “You homewrecker.”

“Oh, don’t! He didn’t say anything about his wife. He still hasn’t. Maybe he didn’t want to make me feel silly. Fat chance of that! I felt so embarrassed when Gladys pointed out his wedding ring. I guess she’s better at picking these things than I am.”

“And how does this impact on the torch you’re carryin’ for the guy?”

“I wasn’t devastated, or anything. You can have a crush without being in love with somebody. Gladys has a crush on Tyrone Power, but she still loves James.”

Betty makes a face. “I’m not sure that’s the best example to use, considering they’ve both stepped out on each other.”

Kate always used to get this look on her face like a door slamming shut, whenever someone bossier than she was disagreed with her. Now, she doesn’t so much as flinch. She’s come so far, in just a few months. “I think it is. They’re getting on so much better recently. Haven’t you seen how happy Gladys has been? Singing in the shower after work, pinning that photo of the two of them inside her locker-”

“Necking frantically outside the factory gates,” says Betty, with an exaggerated shudder.

Kate laughs. “I think it’s sweet. I wish someone would do that with me.” She seems to shrink into herself as soon as she says it. Betty has always gotten the impression that it’s hard for Kate to talk about wanting to be kissed.

Yet she can’t help but hear the word “someone,” ringing out like a bell. It’s nonspecific in a way Betty is all too familiar with. She’s danced this dance before, with other women. Sometimes it came to something, sometimes it didn’t. Oh, God, how she wants that ambiguity to mean something now. “Someone like Leon?”

“Not Leon. Just someone.” Their street car pulls up to the Vic Mu stop, and the women begin to rise from their seats, gathering purses and calling to friends outside on the platform. Kate stands and adjusts her beret. “So, what do you say to that drink tonight?”

“You and me?” asks Betty.

“You and me.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: In this chapter, Kate’s friendship with Leon is briefly discussed in the context of it being potentially scandalous, because of his race. Let me know if you think this deserves a more specific warning.
> 
> Notes: These scenes are set between Vera’s attack of PTSD on the stencil line, and Gladys getting fired/the Pearl Harbor announcement.
> 
> Disclaimer: All characters and environments belong to Michael Maclennan and Adrienne Mitchell/Shaw Media

In the wake of Vera’s screaming fit on the stencil line, Lorna is nowhere to be seen. So, as the next most senior worker on the floor, Marco insists that Betty go and sit in the infirmary, to hold a bag of ice to her bruised shoulder.

It aches quite a bit, but the pain is hardly unbearable, especially when Kate is slow to let go of her hand, when she asks Marco, “Should I go with her?”

“Don’t sweat it, Kate, I’ll be all right,” says Betty. She manages to sound remarkably composed, considering that she is still giddy from Kate’s piercing stare, the quiet intensity in her voice when she said that the sight of Betty in danger made her heart stop. Perhaps it’s best if they’re apart for half an hour. If she lets herself feel much more, she’ll end up doing something stupid like hauling off and kissing Kate full on the mouth in front of everybody.

When she arrives at the infirmary, Vera and Edith are there already. Edith is talking to Vera in a low voice while Vera sits glassy-eyed. After a second’s hesitation, Betty takes a seat beside them. Neither of them gives the impression that they don’t want her to join them, but still, it’s strange to be back with Edith and Vera. They used to be Betty’s especial friends at work, but since Vera’s accident and the death of Edith’s husband, they haven’t been as close. Vera wouldn’t let Betty come and visit her in the hospital, not until that very last day, when Betty essentially barged in and demanded to see her.

The three of them go back awhile. Edith was already working at Victory Munitions when Betty and Vera were firsties together. Betty didn’t think much of Vera when they met. All of Vera’s questions during the induction related to her appearance (“Can I wear nail polish on the line?”). Betty was so annoyed by the way Vera constantly made eyes at the floor boys that it took her several weeks to notice that Vera hadn’t made a single mistake on the line.

Betty hadn’t reckoned Edith much either, in those early days. The tart and the housewife, what were they doing working in a munitions factory? This was a place for serious-minded women, like Betty. (This was a refuge for freaks and inverts, like Betty. What were these normal people doing, cluttering it up?)

She feels like a prize-winning moron, knowing that she ever thought about them that way. She’s always had this habit of writing people off before she gets to know them. Particularly women. Again, it’s odd for Betty, that she fancies other girls, considering how reluctant she is to get to know them.

Finally, Vera manages to speak. “What the heck am I gonna do now?” says Vera, her voice shaking. “They can’t have a worker who’s gonna scream blue murder every time she works the stencil line. They’ll can me before the day is out, no matter how bad it makes ‘em look.”

“Who can say it’ll happen every time you work there? For God’s sakes, it’s only your first day back,” Edith says. “You just need time.”

Vera shakes her head. “I’ve _had_ time. I had months in the hospital. It didn’t make a damn bit of difference. I thought I was so brave, coming back to work. What a joke! I really will have to go back to my folks now. I’ve got nothing.”

“Don’t get so down,” says Betty. “Believe it or not, you do have a brain inside that blonde head of yours-”

“Awful big of you to admit that I’m not completely stupid,” Vera snaps. Betty is not what you would call stricken – she and Vera used to trade friendly barbs day in and day out – but Vera’s face falls as soon as the words are out. “Look, just ignore me. I haven’t slept properly since Armistice Day.”

“Why, what happened on Armistice Day?” Edith asks.

Vera buries her face in her hand, hiding the scarred side. “Well, that was the day I found out I was leavin’ the hospital, wasn’t it?” she says wearily.

Betty barrels on. “What I meant was that you’re not licked yet. There’s gotta be something you can do around here, if you can’t work the stencil line. You’ve got a high school education, after all. That’s more than I ever had. More than most of us floor girls, I’d wager.” Betty reaches over and gives Vera’s other hand a squeeze.

Vera squeezes back, but sends Betty a quizzical look. “Since when are you such a little ray of sunshine?”

Edith smiles. “It’ll be Kate’s influence. She’s made quite a change in our Betty. They get on like a house on fire.”

“Yeah, we do.” Betty clears her throat. “In fact, I’ve asked Kate to share a place with me, after all this is over.” She says it proudly, but her mouth still goes dry. It’s the first time she’s floated the idea with anyone other than Kate herself.

Vera’s brows lift. “Terrific way to snag a husband, shacking up with another girl. You’re a fine one to talk about not giving up on yourself.”

There was a time when Betty would respond with a self-deprecating quip, or a pithy remark along the lines of, _“Have you seen the men stickin’ around here now? Have you talked to them? Swearing off ‘em’s an act of self-preservation.”_ She doesn’t want to now. She’s not apologising for herself any more. She doesn’t have to pretend like the only way she could want Kate is if she couldn’t get anyone better. There _isn’t_ anyone better, as far as Betty’s concerned. If one of Betty’s brothers brought home a girl like Kate – kind, thoughtful, smart and gorgeous, with a singing voice that makes a person want to cry and laugh and make love, all at once – everyone would be gunning for them to get wed as quickly as possible. But because Betty’s a woman, Kate suddenly turns into someone she’d have to be crazy to want to be with?

_It’s idiotic,_ she thinks, more confidently than she ever has before. _It’s completely stupid, people thinking I shouldn’t love Kate because we’re both women._

“I want something that’s just mine,” she says flatly. “Turns out Kate does too. That’s not a crime, is it?”

That came out a little more defensively than she had planned. Luckily, Vera and Edith are sturdier than they seem at first glance. They don’t require smelling salts every time Betty speaks her mind. It’s one of the things she likes most about them.

“‘Course it’s not,” says Edith. “Kate’s a real sweetheart. If you two think you might not drive each other up the wall, why shouldn’t you share, for a bit?”

Vera snorts. “You can talk as much as you like about giving up men. You’ll start singin’ a different tune at the first whiff of them giving up on _you._ ”

“Come off it,” says Betty impatiently. She’s never been able to stand it when girls sit around sighing that they’re not pretty. “You’re still a knockout. You could get any fella in this place, scars or no.” She used to feel very self-conscious, telling girls that they were good-looking, but now she truly doesn’t care. She doesn’t have to worry about unfortunate subtexts in her words, because there is no hidden meaning here.

Edith says, “What about Marco? He visited you all those times in hospital, brought you all those pastries.”

“I can’t see him that way. Not after what happened.” Vera finally cracks a smile. “Besides, Moretti’s got himself a mystery gal.”

Edith tuts. “Aw, Marco’s got a new secret girlfriend every week. Don’t lose hope.”

“I told you, I never had hope to begin with. It’s finished between us, he’s just a pal. And it sounds like he’s pretty smitten with this one. Keeps goin’ on about how sweet and old-fashioned she is, not common and obvious like all the other girls.” Vera chuckles. “Hey, maybe it’s Kate!”

“Kate’s not as old-fashioned as some people think,” Betty protests.

“I should say not, after all these months of keeping you company,” Edith says. “You’re a bit unusual, Betty McRae. It’s obviously been an education for her.”

It’s just typical, that as soon as Betty stops worrying about hidden meanings in her own words, she starts madly looking for them in other people’s. She searches Edith’s face, searches Vera’s, for the slightest sign of innuendo. _Do you know I’m in love with Kate?_ Maybe they know, maybe they don’t. Maybe she’ll tell them … in about fifty years, when they’re all pearl-strung old ladies.

In all seriousness, whether they know precisely what’s up, the fact is that they’re still sitting with Betty, regardless of her being _unusual._ And they’re hardly a pair of innocents. Vera suffered a life-changing accident, and Edith lost the father of her children. Maybe they’re aware that there are more important things in life than who you want to go to bed with. Betty hopes so. She would like to tell them, someday, about the way she feels about Kate. Perhaps even before they all hit retirement age.

The siren goes for lunch. Edith and Betty rise to leave, before realising that Vera isn’t following. “Are you gonna be okay to eat with everybody else? We can easily bring your tray in here,” offers Edith.

Vera gives a tremulous sigh. “No, I’m all right. I _am,_ ” she insists, at Betty and Edith’s doubtful looks.

Betty is unspeakably proud of the way Vera swans into the canteen like she’s God’s gift to Vic Mu, taking a seat at their old table as if she’s holding court. Edith sits beside her, and Betty across from her. Vera doesn’t react when Betty murmurs, “Well done,” she just begins, slowly, methodically, to eat her lunch.

When Betty sees Kate walk in, she smiles widely, to let Kate know that everything is all right. Kate’s face is clouded over as she slides into the seat on Betty’s left. “I’m being followed,” says Kate quietly, spearing a piece of broccoli with unusual savagery.

Frowning, Betty looks around for Kate’s pursuer. “The floor boys aren’t giving you trouble again, are they? Tell me which one, Kate. I’ll give him a piece of my mind.”

“What?” Kate’s expression softens. “No. Somebody else.”

As if on cue, Gladys appears at the head of their table, clutching her lunch tray. She looks meek and sheepish. It makes her appear much younger than her twenty-two years. When she speaks, her voice is filled with regret. “Vera, I am so terribly sorry about getting you to sub in. I never would have asked if I’d known. And Betty … oh, Betts, is your shoulder all right?”

They stare at her. Well, Edith, Betty and Vera do. To everyone’s total surprise, Kate makes a small, irritable noise and begins poking disconsolately at her food, stubbornly avoiding Gladys’ eyes. Being so soundly ignored by Kate – sweet, sunny-natured Kate, who normally has the patience of a saint – makes Gladys droop visibly. Betty can almost see what she must be thinking: _If Kate of all people is rejecting me, I haven’t a prayer of getting through to any of the others._

“I can sit somewhere else today,” says Gladys, with as much dignity as she can muster. “I just wanted to apologise, that’s all.” She turns to go.

Betty rolls her eyes. “Spare us the dramatics, Katherine Hepburn, and sit yourself down. We’re not mad. Are we, girls?”

Vera shrugs. “Apology accepted.” With a smirk, she adds, “Just lob a pair of silk stockings my way and we’ll call it even.”

Gladys gratefully takes a seat on Betty’s other side. “I couldn’t ask for better friends, truly,” she says in a rush.

“You’re a dope, Gladys, but you’re our dope,” says Edith. “Let’s put it behind us. I’m too worn out to hold grudges. I’ve been up half the night with my little girl.”

“Why, what’s wrong?” Kate and Gladys ask with one voice. Gladys’ eyes flicker toward Kate, but Kate still won’t look at her.

“Daph found out their daddy’s not coming back.”

“Edie, why didn’t you say anything?” Vera demands. “Here’s me, bawling and flapping my gums about my problems, when you’ve just had to tell your kids about Doug.”

“I didn’t tell them, that’s just the problem. Skip found out and he blurted it out at dinner. Daphne cried herself sick. I would’ve kept her off school, but I can’t send her to my mother-in-law’s place, she’s coping worse than I am. Doug was her only son.” Edith puts down her fork, having seemingly lost her appetite. “I don’t know what to do with them now.”

“May I make a suggestion?” asks Gladys. She sounds more timid than Betty has ever heard her, but somehow still sure of herself.

Edith shrugs. “I think I could use all the help I can get.”

“Well, when my brother Laurence died two years ago, I used to go out on my bicycle, and ride until I was too tired to think. My parents thought it wasn’t showing the proper respect, but I think Laurie would’ve understood, because it really helped me. Of course, I was grown up when I lost my brother, but I think the principle still stands. Getting out of the house is good for you, when you’ve lost someone. Just … just keep on like you’ve been, taking them to fly kites and feed the ducks. It’ll help them feel safe, like the world will still carry on turning.”

Again, Betty is reminded of her unfortunate habit of writing people off the moment she lays eyes on them. When she saw Gladys waltz through the front gates on her first day, wearing stiletto heels, elbow-length gloves and a _veil,_ of all things, Betty would never have dreamed that she could give practical advice about grief. Gladys is insufferable and maddening and the type of person Betty would normally never associate with … and yet, she’s somehow become one of Betty’s very best friends. Another good thing Kate has brought into Betty’s life.

Edith smiles wanly. “Thanks, Gladys. I’ll try that.”

“Gosh, we are a cheerful table, aren’t we?” Vera shakes her head. “I think Kate’s the only one who hasn’t had anything bad happen to her today.”

Kate gives a wry laugh. “Don’t jinx me, Vera!”

“Well, bad things always happen in threes,” Betty is quick to interject. “Today, that’s been Edith, Vera and me. I’d say Kate _and_ Gladys are off the hook.” She turns to Kate and says boldly, “You can thank me later.”

The words come out so naturally. No sooner has Betty started to panic, started to think, _My God, McRae, tone it down, you can’t flirt with her in front of the entire canteen-!_ than Kate has smiled and said, “My hero. I’ll buy you _two_ drinks after my singing lesson tonight.”

“Singing lessons? You sing so well already,” Edith says. “The other week, when I was due for my visitor, you started singing _The Way You Look Tonight_ on the line, and I nearly bust out crying.”

“Thanks, Edith, but I’ve still got a lot to learn. Luckily, I have a great teacher. Leon Riley from the store room is teaching me to sing the blues,” says Kate. “Didn’t you hear him sing at the canteen dance?”

Betty winces a little at this – not because she’s hugely threatened by Kate’s crush on him, but because after all this time, Kate’s still proudly announcing that she consorts with black men after hours. Betty’s been trying to be less prejudiced, but she’s got no idea how Vera and Edith will react. She readies herself to defend Kate’s right to have whatever friends she chooses...

“He’s pretty dishy,” is all Edith says, but her mouth quirks like she's trying not to smile.

Kate blushes. “Leon’s just a friend.”

“A friend, who’s happily married,” Gladys chips in, determined to help.

Vera sips some water. “Well, _I’ll_ believe you, Kate. If we band together, us with our men friends, maybe Edith’ll stop banging on about me trying again with Marco.”

Their table enters into a lively debate about whether men and women can just be friends. It’s almost like old times, before Kate and Gladys. It’s like the best of old times and new times; because all of Betty’s good friends are here. The only thing which is not free and easy is the way Kate doesn’t smile whenever Gladys cracks a joke, the way Gladys keeps sending Kate little pleading looks, which Kate ignores.

All of a sudden, one of the secretaries from upstairs appears at the head of their table. Surveying them, she asks, “Is one of you Gladys Witham?”

“That’s me,” says Gladys, with a little wave.

“You’re wanted up in Mr Akins’ office,” she says with a sniff, turning on her heel and marching out of the canteen the moment she’s delivered the message.

Edith blinks. “Such lovely manners they’ve got, up in the ivory tower. I can’t think why you ever left, Gladys.”

“Don’t trip on the way out, dearie!” Vera calls after the secretary. She stares after her, lips pursed in thought.

Kate speaks for the first time in minutes. “You’d best not keep him waiting, Gladys.”

Gladys’ shoulders slump a little, at this final jab from Kate. Silently, she gets to her feet, busses her tray, and leaves for her meeting with the boss.

Betty, Vera and Edith all look askance at Kate. “Well, it’s five minutes ‘til afternoon shift,” says Vera. “I’m gonna take my powder break now, so my powder break can be my cigarette break.”

Edith nods. “Now, there’s an idea.” They rise from the table. “Coming, you two?”

Without looking at each other, Kate and Betty shake their heads in unison. “We’ll see you on the floor,” says Betty.

After they’ve left, a minute or so passes without Kate or Betty speaking. Finally, Betty ventures, “Gotta say, I never thought I’d see the day when I’d be quicker to forgive than you. Particularly Gladys!”

“You could’ve been killed.” Kate says it almost bitterly. “All because she couldn’t wait until lunch to ask for time off.”

“Come on, Kate. I’m not steamed about it. It was just a stupid mistake. Yeah, Gladys can be a pain in the ass, but she’s a good sort, underneath.”

“She is, but I’m allowed to be angry.” After a moment, Kate repeats herself, “I’m allowed to be angry, Betty. Last night made me realise that I don’t know how I’d get along without you.”

_How many times,_ thinks Betty weakly, _how many times are you gonna make me swoon like a goddamned schoolgirl today?_

“You’d manage,” says Betty. “I think you’d more than manage. But … I’d rather we managed together.”

Kate smiles. “Me too.” She glances at Betty. “Your turban’s gone a bit skewiff.”

Betty suddenly becomes aware of the lock of hair brushing her cheek. She raises a hand to anchor it back into place, but finds herself grimacing in discomfort. It hurts to hold her hand higher than her shoulder.

“You poor thing. Let me.” Kate leans closer and begins to tuck the loose strands of hair back inside Betty’s turban. She doesn’t seem to give a damn how this might look to all the other women still crowding the canteen. She doesn’t seem overly concerned that if Betty were to turn her head slightly and lean forward a few inches, they’d be kissing. _And if Kate’s not fussed, why should I be?_

Kate’s hands are as skilled as they are gentle. They can heft a twenty-five pounder onto a fast-moving hook as easily as they can caress a microphone stand. Betty can’t help but notice every tiny way they differ from her own, can’t stop herself imagining what it would be like to have those hands touching her...

“There, now you’re perfect.” Kate moves away, looking pleased with her handiwork but also slightly dubious. “Are you sure you’re okay to work? Maybe we should see about getting you home early.”

“Kate, we’re on the amatol line, remember? Not much raising my arms over my head there.”

“Tell me if there’s anything else I can do for you,” says Kate earnestly.

“Just try not to bite Gladdie’s head off, will you?”

“I’ll try.” In spite of herself, Kate laughs. “You, reminding me to be nice? It’s like we’re changing places.”

_Are we changing places?_ Betty wonders. _I always thought you had no idea how I feel about you, but maybe ... maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe I’m the clueless one, here._ She manages to be normal as they get up and start walking to their next shift, calling to her co-workers, cracking sarcastic comments to make Kate laugh. It’s incredible that she can keep going on, with all the new, unfamiliar hope she has.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Some period-appropriate pejorative terms for German and Japanese people are used briefly in this chapter. Let me know if you think this deserves a more specific warning.
> 
> Notes: The song Kate sings is God Bless the Child by Billie Holiday.
> 
> Disclaimer: All characters and environments belong to Michael Maclennan and Adrienne Mitchell/Shaw Media.

The workers of Red Shift are lining up as their shift matron inspects them. Blue Shift women call to the Reds, who have been able to listen to more than the initial announcement of the attack on Pearl Harbor, imploring them for updates, death tolls, more information, more. Betty spots Hazel standing with her eyes fixed on the ground. She looks on the verge of tears. They used to be good mates, Hazel and Betty. Betty knows she should yell to her, ask if she’s all right, but right now, all she can manage is to clutch Kate’s hand and keep walking toward their street car stop.

The street car is packed when they climb on, with no spare seats, together or separately. Betty tries not to show her discomfort when people bump into her injured shoulder, but Kate is watching her like a hawk. Before Betty knows it, Kate is approaching two teenage boys and asking, “Excuse me, but my friend over there has a badly bruised shoulder, and I think she’d like to sit down.”

The boys look where Kate is indicating, biting back grins. They could be taking in Betty’s short hair and trousers, her furrowed brow and her conspicuous lack of a wedding ring. On the other hand, they could just be staring to be cheeky. Betty gets so tired of trying to work out the precise reasons why people are gawping at her.

“She’s fine,” says one boy, at the same time that his friend says, “You don’t stand on your shoulder.” Both boys seem to find this quip hilarious and start sniggering.

“It’s a real comfort,” Kate snaps, “knowing that the type of young men who are going to be defending our country in a year or two are also the type who won’t give up their seat for a woman who was hurt building bombs to win this war. You must be pretty incredible if you think you’re better than her. What, may I ask, did you do today that makes you so damn special?”

It is the first time Betty has ever heard Kate utter any kind of profanity. It doesn’t come to her easily. Betty could see her working up to that word, willing herself to force it out.

Shamefaced, first one boy, then the other, move from their seats and push their way into the crowded aisle, trying to put as much distance between themselves and Kate as possible.

“I don’t need a seat, it’s her,” Kate says in exasperation. “I wasn’t trying to get myself a...” She trails off.

“Come on, you snagged us these plum seats. Might as well enjoy ‘em.” Betty has to pull Kate by the hand, to make her sit down.

Kate still smells like the yellow soap they use in the showers at work. She’s scrubbed off her makeup, so they’re as bare-faced as each other, for once. Betty likes Kate whether she’s made up or not. Honestly, if she wasn’t in love with her already, she’d be head over heels after that little display. People don’t stick up for Betty all that often.

It’s then that Betty notices. “Kate, you’re shaking.”

“I’m not very used to being angry,” says Kate stiffly. “It doesn’t agree with me.”

“No-one would think it to watch you. Even I was a little afraid.”

“You don’t ever need to be afraid of me,” Kate says absently, patting Betty’s knee and gazing out the window. She says it as warmly as she’s ever said anything, yet there is a tension in Kate’s voice that tells Betty it would be best to pass the rest of their journey in silence.

When they arrive back at the rooming house, they slip inside their own bedrooms wordlessly. About twenty-five minutes later, there is a diffident knock at Betty’s door. Kate’s knock. Kate steps into the room, pulling the door shut behind her. “I thought I’d check on you before I left.” Judging from her expression at the two cigarettes still sending up smoke from the ashtray, the blaring radio and the fifth of whiskey in Betty’s hand, she seems to think this is not uncalled for.

Betty eyes Kate, who is freshly made up, her hair glowing after a vigorous combing. She remembers Kate’s singing lesson with Leon ... remember that, for all intents and purposes, Kate asked her out on a date this morning. Presumably, it’s a perfectly platonic drink between two close female friends, but it was so momentous for Betty that she wonders how on earth she could have forgotten.

“You look nice,” Betty says cautiously.

“That’s quite enough of that,” says Kate, deftly switching off the radio.

“We’ve gotta keep listening to the updates. If the Americans got hit, we could be next. We could miss something important, like evacuation instructions.”

“Don’t think about that right now.” Kate crosses to Betty’s bed, in order to turn back the blankets and arrange the pillows. “You need to rest your shoulder.”

“How is thinking too much gonna hurt my shoulder?”

Kate laughs, but she appears distracted. “You need to rest so you can heal.”

Betty hesitates. “I was gonna come to your practice, though. I could use a drink, couldn’t you?”

“If you wait here, I’ll bring a bottle, and we can have a drink when I get back.”

Betty supposes that’s reasonable. They’ll still get their drink, just the two of them. There will be other dates, friendly or otherwise. But somehow, she can’t bring herself to just watch Kate leave. It’s not because she’s meeting Leon. It’s because this has been the hardest day either of them has had in quite some time, and it’s not even over yet.

“It doesn’t feel that bad, honest,” she insists. “Some fresh air would do us both good. I know the amatol’s been getting to my head all day.”

Something flashes in Kate’s eyes. She sits on the bed and pats the space beside her. Betty sits down without question.

“I know how to get you to lie down,” says Kate, her voice low and private. She puts her hand on Betty’s waist, running her fingers down to Betty’s hip. In all her twenty-eight years of living, Betty’s never given much thought to her hip, as a body part, but it seems to be trying to make up for lost time. Every nerve ending in her body flees her extremities to cluster directly under Kate’s palm. Suddenly, she’s more aware of Kate’s hand on her hip than of anything else in the room, like she’s floating in endless space, anchored only by that slim-lined hand.

Betty is struck by the expression on her face. It’s a … a knowing expression, that’s the best way that Betty can describe it. Like Kate’s effortlessly seen through everything Betty pretends to be, like she’s amused that anyone’s been taken in by Betty’s dreadful impersonation of a woman who is too tough and ultra-sensible to feel things like other women do.

“How?” she croaks out. She’s actually scared. It’s idiotic, but she is. She’s experienced such highs and lows since last night. It has never seemed more likely that Kate might return her feelings. They’re finally alone, and now Betty is just … scared. Scared of how things might change. Scared that she’ll make a fool of herself.

Staring straight into Betty’s eyes, Kate starts to sing. “Them that’s got shall get, them that’s not shall lose. So the Bible says, and it still is news. Mama may have, Papa may have, but God bless the child that’s got his own, that’s got his own...”

If anyone had told Betty, the day before Kate arrived, that someone would walk into her life whose singing would make her feel as though they were running their hands over the lines of her body, kissing the space directly over her heart … Betty would have laughed in their face. She would have said quite firmly that people like that didn’t exist. Certainly not for her.

She feels so hopeless, listening to Kate sing. It is a wonderful, awful kind of hopelessness. Like she’s dying, slowly and quickly, all at once, over and over. It robs Betty of all her words, strips away all her defences, until all that is left is a different Betty, one who doesn’t even know words like _queer_ or _pervert._ She imagines that Betty as the little girl she was almost twenty years ago; a scrawny, barefoot ragamuffin wearing a faded frock cut down from one of her mother’s old ones, stammering out, _“You sing real pretty, and I like your hair.”_

Betty doesn’t want to feel hopeless any more. She just wants to turn to her and say straight out, _“Kate, people might say I’m sick, feeling the way I feel about you, but I’ve never felt less sick in all my life. The only person whose opinion I care about is you. Please, please say it’s okay for me to love you.”_ Betty’s lips move, but no sound comes out.

Without being especially loud, Kate’s singing fills Betty’s bedroom, the hallway, the rooming house, the whole world. The notes drift around Betty, touching her skin gently and reverberating off. When Kate lays her down, she offers no resistance. If people back home could see her now, Betty imagines they wouldn’t even recognise her. Kate has wrought such a change in her.

Betty tries to keep breathing long and slow, so Kate will think she’s asleep. But when Kate speaks, it’s clear she isn’t fooled. “I can’t stop you from coming, Betty. I just need to be alone for a little while, to think. It would be nice to have you there, but I honestly think you should rest. I don’t know. Truth is, the second I walk out of here, I’m going to wish you were with me. All these choices, it’s hard to know what you really want. Just lie down for an hour, all right? I’ll be back real soon.” The door clicks shut behind her.

Betty truly means to keep her promise (not that she made one, but everything she does at Kate’s insistence tends to feel like a solemn vow). She means to lie still, rest her bruised shoulder and wait patiently for Kate to return. But what Betty means to do and what she actually does are often two entirely different things. She finds herself getting up, switching on the radio and pacing the room. Betty takes a bottle of gin from her bureau drawer and has a drink. She has several. Taking this course of action – the radio, the pacing, and the alcohol – is not the cleverest idea she’s ever had, but she can’t stop herself. Sometimes it seems like that will be written on her headstone someday: _Elizabeth “Betty” McRae, died a suspiciously butch spinster. She couldn’t stop herself._

… What if Hitler wins? He _can’t._ In all human reason, he can’t. It’s absolutely unthinkable. Yet it has never seemed more likely than it does right now. Betty is assaulted by visions of the Krauts marching straight into Toronto, the Japs firebombing the city into oblivion, of everyone Betty knows being sent to internment camps or even lined up and shot – of being unable to find Kate before the world ends.

Everything else seems so insignificant, now that the war might really be coming to Canada. Has Betty really spent the last few months hazing Gladys, getting drunk in the evenings, and pussyfooting around the woman she loves, timidly dropping hints about sleeping in the same bed and maybe sharing a house someday? She never would have imagined that would be how she’d spend her last few months. But then again, she never dreamed that she would meet someone as amazing as Kate. She doesn’t have nearly as many regrets as she thought she would.

Betty drains her drink, stoops to her bedside drawer, and finds Kate’s photos. Kate didn’t ask for them back, so Betty’s been keeping them safe for her. She’s always assumed that Kate just wanted to put them out of her head, and forget that whole nasty episode. That’s got to be the reason. But what if ... what if, on some level, Kate wanted Betty to be able to see her as a woman, to know what she looks like under her white work overalls and baggy cardigans and flowered dresses? To know that her body has other secrets to tell, quite apart from the marks her father left on her back?

_After all,_ Betty thinks, mind attempting to reel through the alcoholic mire she’s made of it, _it’s not like she pranced over to Gladys and handed her one of these as a remembrance of their happy times working at Vic Mu. I sure as hell wouldn’t, if I got a bunch of cheesecake shots done._

Regardless of Kate’s intentions, keeping the photos was not the stealthiest move Betty’s ever made. Lots of women have snaps of their friends, but it takes a particular kind of woman to keep a sheaf of photos of their best friend in a skimpy bathing suit in their bedside drawer. If anyone found them, she’d be sunk.

Looking through these photos ought to make Betty feel like some dirty little schoolboy, sweating to the peak of pleasure over pinups of Ava Gardner or Veronica Lake. But it feels okay. To Betty, the caption at the bottom of the photo, “Kate Andrews, 24, from Toronto,” is a laughably insufficient description, on a par with describing this war as “a big fight” or the whole world as “a rock in space with people on it.”

She _wants_ Kate, but she knows her, too. She knows that Kate believes in God, that she wears a little locket that says _Marion,_ that her favourite drink is gin and tonic, that Billie Holiday is her idol. Betty knows that when the sky over the factory filled with black smoke and Marco came stumbling through the gates covered in blood, Kate went barrelling toward the test field as fast as anyone.

Betty knows Kate, but it’s not enough any more, not if they don’t have that much time left. _I want you to know me too,_ she thinks.

She shuffles past photos of Kate preening, arching her back, tossing her beautiful hair, until she finds the one showing Kate from the shoulders up. “I love you,” she says, and it’s the first time she’s said it aloud, to anyone, really. Betty should feel a lot dopier about this, confessing her feelings to a bloody photo, but the radio is drowning her out, and well, she has had rather a lot to drink.

Her head is filled with _“I need you”_ and _“Not Leon. Just someone”_ and _“My heart stopped.”_ Does Kate know? Does she feel the same? She has to. She’s declared herself so many times, much more than Betty, who’s been too damn scared.

_People think she’s some little shrinking violet, but she’s not. She’s a hell of a lot braver than me,_ Betty thinks ruefully. She voices her next thought to the empty room: “God, what am I waiting for, any more?”

Betty shoves the photos back into her bedside drawer. She gets to her feet, pulls on her coat and grabs her purse. She strides right out of her bedroom, down the stairs, past Jeannie and Phyllis, who are talking gravely, past Dolores, whose arm is around a crying Aggie. Someone yells that she just missed Kate, and Betty replies grimly, “I’ll say.”

She doesn’t know what she’ll do when she gets to Tangiers, whether she’ll burst through the doors and shout, _“Kate, I’m madly in love with you,”_ or simply sit in the corner, smoking fiercely and not saying a word while Kate laughs with Leon. What Betty will do is irrelevant. All she knows is that she needs to be with Kate. If this is the last day of her life, if the dark that rolls in tonight never lifts again, Kate is the only thing that matters.

As she steps through the front doors, a chill wind races down the street and engulfs her. Betty gasps and then lets out a laugh, more from shock than anything else. Like some stupid kid, she’s remembered her coat, but neglected a scarf or gloves.

She doesn’t nip back inside the rooming house to fetch them, just shoves her hands deep into her pockets, tucks her chin into her chest and walks determinedly on, towards Tangiers, and Kate. She means to walk now as she intends to for the rest of her life. You don’t ever get to turn back, when you’re changing the course of history.


End file.
